Will Caine - The Inquiry

‘Curious man, Francis Morahan,’ said Temple. ‘Something inscrutable, almost odd, about him. Never thought his resignation was what it seemed. Clever though. And affable enough. I wouldn’t have imagined him as a doer. Not in the way you’re now describing.’

‘He seems determined.’

‘Good for him. Give those rascals a kick up the posterior.’ He frowned. ‘But why you? Must be others he could get?’

‘I’ve asked myself – and him – that. He’s insistent.’

Temple sighed. ‘Well, dammit, he’s right. You’re the best. But do you have to?’

She worried about sounding pretentious. ‘I feel it’s my duty. He needs a specific job done. I said I’d give him three months, no more.’

‘Duty. Hmmm…’ He affected to examine her. She silently held his eye. ‘You mean it, don’t you?’

‘Yes, I think I do.’

He spoke with an unusual tenderness. ‘Then you must do it. But stick to your guns and don’t get bogged down. These inquiries go on for ever. Do the job he wants and then come back.’

‘That’s a deal.’ She stuck her hand out and he formally shook it, both now at ease. ‘I’m sorry to leave you in the lurch, Ludo.’

‘It’s fine. Next week’s prep and I’m not back in court till the week after. I’ll grab Sheila instead.’

‘Not literally, I hope.’

‘Ha! Funny girl.’ He screwed up his eyes. ‘Just as well you’re the joker. We’re not allowed to laugh at that sort of thing any more, are we?’

As instructed, Sara arrived the next Monday at the Inquiry offices at 9.15 a.m., having hung around to avoid being early. The tube journey, Tooting Broadway to Vauxhall via Stockwell, was a breeze after the twists and turns to the Temple. She was met at reception by the PA to the Secretary, a squat, bespectacled young man with straggly black hair who announced himself as Clovis Hobbs-Fanshawe and managed nervously to stretch out a hand to shake while forgetting the accompanying smile.

Morahan, in a surprising and warm phone call over the weekend, had told Sara he’d chosen Pamela Bailly as the Inquiry Secretary – effectively its chief executive. She was a Treasury high-flier and therefore, he explained, not from a Department he might be investigating. He also said she was extraordinarily efficient. Sara wondered if Clovis had been terrorised by her. No doubt a bulging Oxbridge brain lurked behind his jumping eyes.

As she was ushered by Clovis into the Secretary’s capacious office, Pamela Bailly sprang up and strode round her desk to offer a firm handshake. Brisk with an edge of brusqueness, tallish, trim, precise, a smart cut of auburn hair shaped to the neckline, she projected a force field of compressed energy. Sara suspected some of it was a cloak, though there was no obvious sign of brittleness on the sculpted red fingernails.

‘Welcome, Ms Shah, delighted to meet you.’

‘Do call me Sara.’

‘I will. Pamela.’ She paused. ‘Not Pam. So… you’re here to chivvy us along.’

Sara smiled, determined to forge some form of bond. ‘I can see that no chivvying is needed.’

‘In some ways not. A great deal of information, research and expertise has been gathered but we’re still some way from formal hearings. Indeed, we’ve only just started the search for counsel. Now his Lordship appears to have pre-empted it.’

‘I think it’s more because he has some specific tasks in mind.’

‘That would appear to be between you and him.’ Was there an edge in her tone? As if her own special access to her Chairman was being disarranged? She seemed a woman for whom control was important. ‘At any rate,’ continued Pamela, ‘he seems to me a reinvigorated man and that is all to the good. We will all do everything we can to help you.’

Sara chided herself for the suspicion. ‘I appreciate that.’

‘Shall we do the tour?’

She led Sara out of her office, past Clovis’s gate-keeping desk and into an open-plan space. From six desks, six heads peered noiselessly up. Four further desks were empty. ‘This is the Secretariat,’ said Pamela nodding briefly to the upturned faces without introducing them. ‘Our junior counsel, Sara Shah.’ The murmur of hellos was almost inaudible. Sara noticed that, despite the nature of the Inquiry, only one face was Asian – a woman, probably in her late twenties, wearing a knee-length skirt and long-sleeved blouse, head uncovered. ‘The spare desks are for our distinguished panel members should they ever care to look in.’

A corridor led off the open-plan area; Pamela led Sara through the first door on the right. An older woman, full bosomed with long, steel-grey hair tied in an imprecise bun, looked up.

‘Sylvia Labone, our archivist,’ said Pamela. ‘Meet Sara Shah, our new junior counsel.’

Sylvia rose with a cough – ex-smoker, Sara immediately assumed. Maybe still – there was a yellowness on her fingers. ‘Good morning, Ms Shah.’ Her voice was throaty, confirming first impressions.

‘Sara, please.’ She looked around at long shelves of files on rails. ‘You’re the keeper of the secrets.’

Sylvia scowled before degenerating into a further cough. ‘If only.’

‘We don’t have a prayer room per se,’ said Pamela, ‘but there might be an appropriate corner here in the library. I mentioned it to Sylvia.’

You really are organised, thought Sara.

‘Of course,’ said Sylvia, ‘whenever you wish. Never mind me, I’ve seen and heard it all.’

Sara followed Pamela along the corridor to an end door that revealed a large office with a broad walnut desk, leather chairs behind and in front, windows to left and right, and a long sofa running along the inside wall. To one side, the view was dominated by the four-square-mass of the American Embassy; to the other, across Nine Elms Road, stretches of the Thames were visible between designer riverside apartment blocks.

‘Sir Francis’s office,’ said Pamela. ‘It was his decision to base us here rather than Whitehall or anywhere near the Law courts. I think he felt across the river was more…’ she searched for the word, ‘appropriate for some of our potential witnesses.’ She inspected the sofa and puffed up its row of cushions. ‘He apologises. He’d wanted to be here in person for your arrival but the Home Secretary asked for a catch-up at the last minute.’

‘Geoff Atkinson,’ said Sara.

‘Yes.’ Her tone hinted at contempt. ‘You’ll find that Sir Francis has his own working pattern. He tends to stay late on Thursday evenings to catch up with the week. I believe he likes the undisturbed peace of a deserted office. I understand his wife shapes her social diary around that. As for everyone else, we’re a nine to six operation and that’s the way I prefer it. If you need to work late, we’ll give you your own key and code.’

‘I’d like that option.’

‘As you will.’

Pamela guided her back along the corridor to a side door they had passed. ‘Finally you. Legal.’ She knocked and entered an office of similar size to Morahan’s but with four desks, smaller windows and walls lined with book shelves. One desk was occupied.

‘Morning, Pamela.’

‘May I introduce Patrick Duke, Government Legal Department. In my view an inelegant change in terminology from Treasury Solicitors,’ said Pamela, again with that edge. ‘Patrick, this is Sara Shah. Sara, I’ll leave you in his hands.’ She bestowed a quick smile on them, turned on her heel and closed the door behind her.

Patrick grinned and shook Sara’s hand. ‘She’s a piece of work.’

‘I can imagine,’ said Sara.

‘Welcome.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Coffee?’

‘Tea would be lovely if you have it.’

‘I’m prepared. Builder’s, Earl Grey, peppermint, chamomile.’